Cairo

Who holds it

Name

Al-Mansur Muhammad, under the regent al-Afdal (away in Syria); a city governor (wali) whose name is not pinned

Title

Seat of the sultan

Since

1198

Confidence

high

Lord in 1200

The boy sultan al-Mansur in his palace; the regent al-Afdal is with the army in southern Syria; the city governor and the commander of the garrison that winter are not pinned.

How things stand that morning

Held in al-Mansur's name; no siege, no fighting. The regent is absent and the Salahiyya, Saladin's own regiment, has gone over to al-Adil.

Charter

None in the European sense: an Islamic city had no charter or commune. It was governed by the sultan's governor (wali) and police chief, the qadi and the market inspector (muhtasib).

Council

No council. The qadi, the notables (a'yan) and the heads of the crafts under the muhtasib speak for the townspeople; the Christian and Jewish communities answer through their own heads.

Communities

Sunni Muslims, now dominant, with Shafi'i, Maliki and Hanafi madrasas founded by Saladin and his officers (al-Qadi al-Fadil's madrasa among them); Copts and Melkite Christians in their quarters (Harat Zuwayla, Harat al-Rum) with their churches; Jews; Kurdish and Turkish soldiers; the remnants of the Fatimid court under guard.

Fairs and markets

No fairs; daily markets. The great public festival is the cutting of the dam of the Cairo canal (al-Khalij) when the Nile reaches its full height in late summer; the two feasts and Ramadan.

Militia

No town militia: the garrison of the citadel and the palace, the sultan's guard and the amirs' households. The old quarters (haras) are named after Fatimid regiments.

Walls and castle

Badr al-Jamali's stone walls and gates of 1087-1092 (Bab Zuwayla, Bab al-Futuh, Bab al-Nasr); Saladin's new wall, begun after 1171 under Qaraqush to join Cairo, the citadel and Fustat in one circuit, unfinished (still under construction in 1238); the citadel (Qal'at al-Jabal) on the Muqattam spur, with its wells, under construction.

Trade and crafts

Markets for cloth, silk, sugar, spices and books; workshops of the Fatimid palace crafts (textiles, metalwork, glass) now working for the market and the amirs; the mint; the government offices (diwans) with their Coptic and Muslim clerks.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. 26 January 1200Death of al-Qadi al-Fadil, the elder statesman of Saladin's reign (natural death).Depends on: Nothing in play. Stopped by: Nothing likely.
2. Early February 1200 (eight days before the entry)Al-Adil besieges Cairo with al-Afdal inside, after defeating him near Bilbeis.Depends on: Al-Adil's victory near Bilbeis. Stopped by: Al-Afdal winning in the field.
3. 9 February 1200 (21 Rabi' II 596; Abu'l-Fida)Al-Afdal surrenders the city and al-Adil enters it; other accounts give 5 February.Depends on: The siege. Stopped by: A relief or a rising of the garrison.

Where the sources disagree

• Do not back-project the citadel as the royal residence (1206) or the Mamluk city.

Evidence: The city's buildings and the 1199-1200 events are well recorded; the names of its governor and garrison commander that winter are not pinned.

On the map: The seed gives the walled city and its near land; Fustat is drawn as its own town to the south-west.

Primary sources for Egypt

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• The Book of the Two Gardens, on the Reigns of Nur al-Din and Saladin, and its Sequel, Abu Shama (Shihab al-Din Abd al-Rahman al-Maqdisi) (about 1240 to 1267, at Damascus). The Rawdatayn ends with Saladin's death in 1193 and matters for 1200 as the store of Imad al-Din al-Isfahani's lost al-Barq al-Shami and of al-Qadi al-Fadil's letters, quoted at length, which describe the Ayyubid princes, the Jazira and the frontier a few years earlier. Read online
• The Chronicle of Ernoul and Bernard the Treasurer, Ernoul, squire of Balian of Ibelin, and later compilers (the 1187 core soon after the event; the whole in its present form 1227 to 1232). The Ibelin household's version of events in Outremer. Read online
• The Complete History, Izz al-Din Ibn al-Athir (about 1200 to 1231, at Mosul). The widest Muslim narrative for the years 596 to 597 AH (1199 to 1201): al-Adil's entry into Cairo and his taking of the sultanate from his nephew al-Mansur Muhammad early in 1200, the quarrels of the Ayyubid princes at Damascus, Aleppo and Hama, the Nile failure and the great famine of Egypt, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah and the Jazira under Gokbori and the Artuqids, Baghdad under the caliph al-Nasir, the Khwarazmshah Tekish's death in 1200 and Muhammad's accession, the Ghurid wars in Khurasan, the Eldiguzids and Georgia, the Almohads in the west, and the Seljuks of Rum in passing. Read online
• The Cream of the History of Aleppo, Kamal al-Din Ibn al-Adim (about 1240 to 1260). The annals of Aleppo. Read online
• The Dispeller of Anxieties, on the History of the Ayyubids, Jamal al-Din Ibn Wasil (about 1272 to 1285, at Hama). The fullest Ayyubid dynastic history, written at Hama with access to the family's own tradition and to Ibn al-Athir, Ibn Abi Tayy and Sibt ibn al-Jawzi. Read online
• The Mirror of Time, on the History of Notables, Sibt ibn al-Jawzi (Shams al-Din Yusuf) (about 1240 to 1256, at Damascus). A Damascene preacher's year-by-year chronicle with obituaries, written by a grandson of the Baghdad scholar Ibn al-Jawzi, so it carries both the Baghdad view (the caliph al-Nasir and his court) and the Damascus view (al-Adil's court, the famine refugees of 1200, prices, the plague of 1201). Read online
• The Old French Continuation of William of Tyre (Eracles), Anonymous continuators, the earliest drawing on Ernoul (about 1220 to 1277; the first continuation (1184 to 1197, the Lyon Eracles) compiled about 1230 from material of the 1190s). For the Latin East at 1200 it narrates the aftermath of the Third Crusade: the truce of 1192, the succession to Jerusalem through Queen Isabella's marriages to Henry of Champagne (died September 1197) and Aimery of Lusignan, Aimery's rule as king of Jerusalem from 1198 while king of Cyprus, the German crusade of 1197 to 1198 and the recovery of Beirut and Sidon, the truce with al-Adil of 1198, the Antioch succession quarrel between Bohemond IV and Leo of Armenia, and the Pisan plot against Aimery. Read online
• The Road to Knowledge of the Dynasties of Kings, Taqi al-Din al-Maqrizi (about 1400 to 1440, at Cairo). A late compilation, but for Ayyubid Egypt it keeps lost material: for 596 to 598 AH it records al-Adil's entry into Cairo, the removal of the boy al-Mansur Muhammad, the oath to al-Kamil as heir, the appointments at Cairo, the low Niles of 1199 and 1200 and the famine and plague of 1200 to 1202 with grain prices, the reports of cannibalism and the death tolls, together with Yemen, the Hijaz and the Mecca emirate. Read online

15 more in the sources library for The Latin East and the Ayyubids.